Comparison of young people's understanding of waste as a consumption practice in a rural-urban context: Example of İzmir

Consumption is defined in the most general terms as meeting the needs ofindividuals in every field. Consumption has started to increase rapidly with the effect of the development of technology and living conditions in the consumer society. Consumption has also become a tool for status and social relations. For this reason, individuals tend to consume for show. The concept of waste, which has started to be used more with this change in the concept of consumption, is defined as excess and waste in consumption. The main purpose of the research is to examine the waste behavior, which is seen as a consumption practice in the consumption society, through the youth, who is the most dynamic part of consumption, and to explain how the young people's understanding of waste differs in rural and urban areas. Since consumption and waste are different types, there are different kinds of relationship between the two concepts. In thisstudy, the concept of waste is planned to be handled within the scope of clothing, food, energy and water waste. The inclusion of all these areas in the study was preferred because it would provide a broader perspective in terms of examining the consumption habits and wasteful behaviors of young people. In addition, this conceptual framework is supported by the theoretical texts of Baudrillard and Veblen in this field. In the research, using the qualitative research method, 20 participants living in the center of İzmir and the villages of Ödemiş District were interviewed. The age range of the participants was determined as 18-30. Participants were selected by snowball sampling technique. The data obtained through the semi-structured interview were analyzed within the framework of the themes determined from the theoretical point of view. In line with these analyses, the most basic result of the study is; young people's understanding of consumption and waste shows some differences in the context of rural and urban. However, despite some differences, the answers given in general show similarities in rural and urban areas. Keywords: Consumption, consumption culture, sense of waste, rural-urban